Item - 2023.EX10.21

The Executive Committee recommends that:

1. City Council receive Attachment 1 to the letter (November 20, 2023) from Councillor Paul Ainslie for information.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) recently shared their Report to Council from the virtual meeting held on September 14, 2023, encouraging all City Councillors to review the resources and initiatives that the FCM is currently prioritizing.     

The report underscores the imperative need for a national conversation regarding the ongoing expansion of municipal responsibilities, weighed with unchanged resources. It emphasizes the necessity to establish stronger connections between municipal revenue, population growth, and economic expansion:

- Municipalities are operating within a nineteenth-century revenue system to respond to 21st-century responsibilities and evolving needs of Canadians.

- Municipalities manage more than 60 percent of Canada’s public infrastructure yet only receive between 8 and 10 cents for each tax dollar collected.

- Emerging from the pandemic, we've seen federal and provincial sales and income taxes increase rapidly while overall municipal property tax revenue has remained flat—or even declined—when accounting for inflation and population growth.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) is calling for a real conversation, with federal, provincial, and territorial governments at the table, focusing on the changes required for Canada’s growing communities to meet both today and tomorrow’s challenges.